Tag Archive for 'Mark McArdle'

We’ve always been at war with Eastasia

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 1 month ago
in Brisbane, Media, Queensland, State/Territory Elections and Urbanism
. 10 Comments

A further sequel to the LNP/Courier-Mail early election mania – Springborg backer Clive Palmer’s 18 year old son, Michael, who’s the LNP candidate for the safe Labor seat of Nudgee, has had a bit more publicity for saying dumb stuff than 18 year old candidates in safe seats usually get. Palmer was slapped down by Tim Nicholls for demanding that Anna Bligh call an election for February 21. Apparently, after the frenzied LNP/Courier-Mail election speculation fest, they’ve now always been committed to seeing that Labor serves a full term.

That’s nice for them, because that’s always been the most probable outcome. Although I do worry about the sunstroke and skin cancer risks unnecessarily run by all those LNP rank & filers sweating it out campaigning on street corners over the Christmas holidays. Treasurer Andrew Fraser reinforced this on Friday in an interview with the Fin Review, discussing the preparations for the June budget and observing:

Anyone who trots out the line the election timing has anything to do with avoiding a June Budget is ill-informed, mostly stupid and probably politically motivated.

I don’t know if he was thinking of The Borg, who judging by the fact that Mark McArdle and Tim Nicholls have been doing all the running for the LNP in the media, is still on hols. Perhaps Lawrence never expected a February poll. Or it may be the ultimate small target strategy. But with Bligh taking a higher profile and announcing good things like a new park at the top of the Kangaroo Point cliffs on crown land overlooking the river and running around the shop spruiking jobs initiatives, they might like to contemplate actually coming up with a political strategy now that Labor’s kicking off its re-election plan.

Queensland Labor resurgent: 57-43

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 3 months ago
in Media, Polls, Queensland and State/Territory Elections
. 12 Comments

I’ve said before that I don’t put too much stock in the quarterly state Newspolls, because they’re taken at such a lengthy interval it’s hard to get a sense of when any movement shown has actually occurred, and it’s more difficult to pick a poll which may be an outlier for various sampling reasons. However, the big shift to Labor in both Queensland and Victoria at state level in the latest lot of polling probably is significant. It’s also shot a huge hole in The Australian’s narrative of a voter desire to “balance” federal Labor by turning away from state ALP governments, which I’ve been suggesting for a long time was just nonsense anyway. In Crikey, Richard Farmer has some fun looking at the reactions (or contortions) from various News Limited journos.

So, what’s going on in Queensland? Anna Bligh’s own numbers were down while Labor’s vote surged, to a point above where it was at the last election (which was won very handily indeed). It’s possible that Bligh herself is suffering a little because she doesn’t fit the mould of the “strong leader” which has always stuck to Queensland Premiers, and which Peter Beattie re-invented. Conversely, there may be a bit of a flight to safety effect in the party vote with the economy slowing. However, here we come across one of the conundrums that haunt the analysis of polling. Queensland Labor types have been suggesting that private polling (which I haven’t seen) has Labor’s vote still on the up but not at such quite stellar heights and Anna Bligh’s numbers better than in Newspoll. I suspect they’re telling the truth, but with these things, as I’ve also said before, the interpretation of the public polls shifts political discourse and in particular the strategy and morale of the opposition.

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